Drip, drip, drip.
At the same time last year, Venezuelan ex-presidential candidate Alejandro Peña Esclusa was sounding the alarm regarding Foro de Sao Paulo and its intentions regarding its neighbor Colombia. He alleged that "Foro de Sao Paulo pretends, first, to create a Colombian-Venezuelan conflict, and second, to begin a coup d'etat in Ecuador, all of which would ruin Plan Colombia."
Whether Foro is truly behind recent events is uncertain, but this spring, another coup attempt was made in Ecuador. Last month, Venezuela's Chávez announced that imports from Colombia would be reduced by 20 percent, in violation of the Andean Pact trade agreement of which Venezuela is part. Last week, with the collapse of ELN-Colombian government talks in Caracas, a series of ELN cross-border attacks from Venezuela began, and the presence of Cuban military and Venezuelan ex-military officials in the FARC distension zone was made public.
The question at hand is: are U.S. interests truly being threatened by the factions making up Foro de Sao Paulo? Venezuela and Cuba by themselves are not a formidable force to contend with, but their influence would appear to be growing. With an electoral victory by their ally da Silva in Brazil, all bets would be off. While his threat to domestic Brazilian industry is still questionable, and while he has foresworn defaulting on the debt, something he had threatened to do in both of his earlier presidential elections, Lula has made clear that internationally, his sympathies do not lie with the United States.***
November 2001 - Ortega concedes defeat*** MANAGUA, Nicaragua (AP) - Sandinista leader Daniel Ortega conceded defeat Monday to the governing party presidential candidate, Enrique Bolanos, who had once been imprisoned by a past Ortega government. ***